the uprising (redux)

by shineyma

Grant, Trip, and Bobbi are undercover when SHIELD falls. [As the title suggests, takes place in the same verse as "a fractured house (redux)", but you shouldn't need to read that to understand this.]

A/N: First of all, thanks very much for all of the comments and kudos on erase myself. It's still in progress, no worries! As are all my other in-progress works. Of which there are several...

I may have a problem.

Second, as the summary mentioned and the title suggests, this takes place in the same verse as my fic a fractured house (redux). It is, again, part of a larger story that I haven't written yet. Here's what you need to know to understand this one:

Grant was never in juvie. He did his time in military school, graduated with honors, and was recruited to SHIELD right out of it. As such, he was never HYDRA. Garrett was his SO, but this Grant is a little more stable, so Garrett never attempted to recruit him, knowing it would be a waste of time. They worked together for a few years (during which time Grant met and started dating Jemma), then Grant was transferred to a strike team, the other members of which were Trip and Bobbi.

They were very effective, despite high levels of mayhem and hijinks. Jemma still joined Coulson's team, but Grant didn't—Garrett had a different second, in this verse, named Marcus Wright, and that's who he sent to join the team and gain intel on Coulson's resurrection.

Which brings us up to the timeline of this fic, so I think that's all you need to know to understand it! If you have any questions, however, you are more than welcome to ask, whether in the comments or at my tumblr.

Third, there will be at least one more chapter to this, because I didn't manage to cover the moment that was the whole point of writing this! It was just getting...really, really long, so I decided to break it up into chapters.

I think that's it! Thanks for reading and, as always, please be gentle if you review!

---

Grant, Trip, and Bobbi are undercover when SHIELD falls.

They're in Serbia, specifically, dealing with a massive ring of drug runners. Bobbi is playing the rich, immoral heiress, aiming to increase her father's fortune by investing in the drug trade. Trip is playing her arm candy, nice to look at but not smart enough to realize that his girlfriend (or "sugar mama," as he keeps teasing her when they're alone) has fallen in with some extremely dangerous people. And Grant is playing the muscle: Bobbi's bodyguard, who doesn't care what she does, only that she's safe while she does it.

He's been considering himself extremely fortunate, these past few months, because his role allows him to be blatant about the close eye he keeps on all of the members of the drug cartel they're dealing with. It also allows him to be heavily—and visibly—armed. Trip, who's only packing what he can conceal in his pockets (and explain away as harmless, should he be searched for some reason), has been going quietly insane since this assignment started, and Bobbi (who can only get away with keeping a pocket revolver in her purse) isn't much better.

So he thought he was lucky when he won the coin toss to play the bodyguard instead of the boyfriend. Sure, sleeping on the tiny couch in the sitting room of the suite they're renting at a luxury hotel (only the best for Bobbi's cover, and he can't protect her from another room) hasn't been fun, but it's better than walking unarmed into the lion's den.

Then SHIELD falls, and that proves what real luck is, because by some miracle, they're not in a meeting with the drug runners when all of SHIELD's files are leaked onto the Internet, thereby blowing all three of their covers spectacularly.

They're actually at the hotel, going over their plan for the next day while Bobbi and Trip spar. They're trying to work out some of their restlessness after spending three months pretending to be (mostly) harmless, and Grant is just sitting back and watching, because he knows better than to get in the middle of all this. The only thing that would accomplish is turning their frustration towards him, and while he is, admittedly, kind of itching for a fight after all this time standing by watching the scum of the earth hurt people…

Well, it takes a special kind of stupid to willingly piss Bobbi and Trip off when they're in this kind of mood.

Which is why, when Bobbi's phone chimes a message alert and she orders him to check it without so much as looking at him, he simply rolls his eyes and gets up to do it.

Not without a smart comment, though. "Getting a little too into the rich girl act, there, Bobbi."

"Yeah," Trip agrees, breathlessly, as he breaks through her chokehold. "Time was, you would answer your own damn phone."

"Time was we got covers where I got to shoot the bad guys instead of having drinks with them," Bobbi shrugs. "Things change. Now check the damn text, Ward."

"I'm going, I'm going."

He crosses the room to where Bobbi's phone is resting on one of the counters in the kitchen area and picks it up, already falling into his bodyguard persona in case he has to respond. Then he's abruptly knocked out of it, because the caller ID says FORWARD.

Phones attached to specialists' covers are set up to forward calls and texts from their personal phones as a matter of course, but it takes an override code to accomplish it, and people who have that code know to use it only in the direst emergencies. If Bobbi is the one getting a text, as opposed to her cover, then something is seriously wrong.

He unlocks the phone hurriedly, and the bottom drops out of his stomach, because the text is just one word, all in caps: PANAMA.

It's code. Code for get the fuck out, your cover's blown, specifically.

He's swearing as he crosses the room to check the door, and Bobbi and Trip break apart to check the windows without bothering to ask what's up. Once he assures himself that the hallway is clear, he tosses Bobbi her phone.

"Panama," he says shortly.

Trip and Bobbi both swear, and then Bobbi, who's closer to the bedroom, runs in to grab their go-bags while Trip joins Grant in securing the door. It won't hold for long—they can't give it any significant trapping, or they'll risk harm to innocent bystanders—but it gives them a few seconds to decide on which escape plan to use.

(And of course they've got several mapped out already. They're specialists.)

"What do you think?" Trip asks, as they move a heavy sideboard to block the door. "Plan A? Plan B?"

"I was liking Plan D better," he says, unscrewing door handle. "Since we've got no idea what the fuck's going on."

"Point," Trip agrees. "Alright, D it is. Unless Bobbi's got any better ideas?"

"Nope," Bobbi says, tossing first Grant, then Trip, their respective go-bags. "D sounds good to me. Let's move, boys."

There's no fire-escape attached to their room. They don't need one. They go out onto the balcony, then, one at a time, balance on the railing and jump from it to the roof of the building next door (which is significantly shorter than their hotel, and the reason they took this particular room on the corner of the fourth floor over any other options).

They hop roof-tops for four blocks, then take to the streets, all in silence. There's no time for theorizing about how their covers got blown, or for worry about how badly this mishap will screw SHIELD's investigation into the drug runners. Their only focus, at the moment, is survival.

They do, naturally, have a safehouse nearby, but with no knowledge of how their covers were broken—or, more importantly, exactly how much of their real identities the drug runners might know—they can't risk using it. Instead, they head straight for the Quinjet they've got hidden on the far side of the city.

They reach it without seeing a single sign of enemy action, which seems odd until, after locking the ramp into place and engaging the Quinjet's cloaking, Grant switches on the radio (intending to contact SHIELD for orders) and receives only static.

That's their first clue that this is bigger than just them.

"What the hell?" Trip asks, leaning over Grant's shoulder.

"I don't know," Grant says. He runs a quick system diagnostic and determines that the Quinjet's communications array is functioning normally. "Whatever the problem is, it's not on our end."

"I'm not getting an answer," reports Bobbi, who's been trying to call the field office in Novi Sad.

For a moment, the three of them just look at one another.

"Try the Triskelion?" Trip suggests eventually.

They don't get an answer at the Triskelion. Or the Hub. Or the New York field office. Or the LA field office, or the Paris field office, or literally any other official SHIELD number they can remember. Also unanswered are all the calls they make to their respective friends and family within SHIELD: Jemma, Sharon, Garrett, Barton, and Romanoff's phones all go to voicemail.

Concern is growing quickly toward panic—but specialists don't panic. They need to shut down their worry for their loved ones and focus on the immediate problem.

"Okay, so," Bobbi takes a deep breath. "Whatever's going on, it's affecting SHIELD on a global scale. Which means…" She falters, looking between Trip and Grant. "What does it mean?"

"I have no idea," Trip admits, slumping back in his seat.

Grant shrugs, at as much of a loss as his partners. He's holding his cover's phone, tossing it from hand to hand as he thinks. He can tell it's irritating Bobbi, but he can't help it. He's itching with the urge to try calling Jemma again—to keep trying until he gets an answer—and the only way to keep himself from actually doing it is to keep in motion.

There's no room for pacing in the Quinjet, so playing with his phone it is.

Fear keeps crawling up his throat, and he keeps shutting it down. He can't think about it—can't allow himself to consider what might be happening to Jemma right now. He just reminds himself, again and again, that she's on a field team now. She's not in the Hub or at the Sandbox. Chances are, she and her team are on a case somewhere, blissfully oblivious to whatever's going down at SHIELD. They probably have no idea that anything's wrong. And she's not answering her phone because…she knocked it off a lab table and broke it. Or something.

There are any number of reasonable explanations. Just because Jemma just happens not to be answering her phone on a day when SHIELD is entirely out of contact doesn't mean she's in danger somewhere. It doesn't.

"The news," Trip says, so suddenly that Grant nearly jumps.

"What?" he asks, but Trip is already getting out of his seat.

"If SHIELD's suddenly gone dark, it'll be on the news," Trip expands, kneeling next to his go-bag and digging through it. He pulls out his laptop and comes back over to sit next to Grant as he boots it up. "We're a global security organization, remember? Someone will have noticed."

"Right," Bobbi says, leaving her seat across from him to sit on Trip's other side. "I keep forgetting we're not a secret anymore."

"Thank you, Chitauri," Grant mutters. His eyes are locked on the screen as Trip opens Chrome and goes to the CNN homepage.

None of them speak as the page comes up. Grant's not even breathing, and he's fairly certain that Trip and Bobbi aren't, either, because the first thing the three of them see is SHIELD IS HYDRA written in twenty-point font.

The second thing they see is a picture of the Triskelion. Or, to be more accurate, a picture of the smoldering wreckage of what used to be the Triskelion.

They're silent as Trip scrolls through the attached story. And as he checks the other major news websites, one by one. None of them speak a single word as the story unfolds in front of them, hours too late to do a damn thing about it: the arrest of Captain America, the leak of all of SHIELD's files onto the internet, and the news that Operation Paperclip, instead of pulling German scientists to the SSR's side, let HYDRA form a foothold in SHIELD before it even began.

They've spent this whole time working for the enemy, and not one of them had a clue.

None of them says a word. They don't need words. They know each other too well for verbal communication to be necessary. They're all worried about the people they love within SHIELD. They're all sick that they've risked their lives not for freedom and safety, but for goddamn Nazis. They all feel betrayed. There's no need to talk about it.

Grant keeps his arm pressed close against Trip's, and he knows that Bobbi will be doing the same on Trip's other side. This is awful for all three of them, but it's the worst for Trip, because this isn't just his life's work that's been revealed as a lie. This is his grandfather's legacy, smashed to pieces on the front page of every news agent in the world.

(He keeps his mind determinedly on Trip and Bobbi, because he can't think about Jemma. He can't.)

Eventually, they reach a point where none of the various news outlets are telling them anything new. Trip leans forward, sets his laptop gently on the floor, and slumps back in his seat. He bangs his head against the wall twice, then goes still.

"Fuck," he says, very, very softly.

Grant swallows. "Yeah."

"Yeah," Bobbi agrees.

They fall back into silence, and stay that way for a very long time.

x

Eventually, the silence is broken by the distinctive buzz of a vibrating cell phone. Trip nearly elbows Grant in the face in his haste to pull his phone out of his pocket, but Grant can't hold it against him.

"Hello?" Trip says. A second later, all of the tension melts right out of him, and he closes his eyes. "Sharon. You okay?"

Grant pats him on the shoulder and then, by silent agreement, he and Bobbi move to the cockpit to give Trip some privacy. He can't resist the urge to check his own phone again, even though he's been holding it this whole time and he knows he hasn't missed any calls.

"I'm sure she's fine," Bobbi says quietly.

"Right," he agrees around the lump in his throat. "Of course she is."

He settles into the pilot's seat as Bobbi takes the co-pilot's. They're both exhausted, but neither one of them will be sleeping. Between escaping the city on foot, the hours they spent trying to contact SHIELD and their loved ones, the hours spent digging through everything the Internet had to offer on the fall of SHIELD, and the hours spent sitting in silence, it's been nearly a full day since they got the text that sent them running from their hotel room.

Nearly twenty-four hours, and he still hasn't heard from Jemma. It's not a good sign.

"We can't stay parked here forever," Bobbi says eventually. "We've all got identities SHIELD didn't know about. We should use some of them, get to a safehouse. Regroup."

"Yeah," he says, turning his phone over in his hands. He feels completely helpless. He can't even suggest the safehouse closest to Jemma's last known location, because he doesn't have one for her. The last time he spoke to her, right before this mission started, she and her team were in New Zealand—but that was months ago.

He can't even look for her. He doesn't even know where to start.

"You should call Hunter," he adds, without looking at Bobbi.

"Yeah," she sighs. "I know."

She doesn't make a move to pull out her phone, though, and Grant doesn't push it.

He tips his head back against the headrest and closes his eyes. Trip's talking to someone else, now—his mother, judging by the tone—and listening loosens something in Grant's chest. At the risk of sounding melodramatic, his own life is still hanging in the balance, and will be until he gets word on Jemma. But Trip is more a brother to him than Christian and Thomas ever were. It's nice to know that he hasn't lost everything.

x

They decide on one of Grant's safehouses, mostly due to proximity. It's outside of Sofia, less than an hour by Quinjet from their current location, and has the bonus of being on a plot of land large enough that they can safely land the Quinjet without worrying about any of the neighbors accidentally coming across it.

Grant stays on the stick the whole way there instead of engaging the auto-pilot. Flying takes concentration, and it keeps him from focusing on his still-silent phone. It keeps him from imagining all of the possible reasons Jemma hasn't called yet—all of the terrible fates she might have suffered.

When they arrive at the safehouse, they take turns in the shower. Grant brings his phone in with him, leaves it on the counter with the ringer turned all the way up, but it remains stubbornly silent. As he showers, as he dresses, as he chokes down the food Trip forces on him—it never so much as beeps a low-battery warning, thanks to the magic (science, an indignant British voice in his head corrects) of SHIELD's long-lasting battery technology. (Or HYDRA's, maybe.)

After the three of them have eaten, Bobbi and Trip both try to convince him to sleep, but only half-heartedly. They know he's just not capable of it right now. Not when it's been more than a day since SHIELD fell and he hasn't heard a single word from his SHIELD-agent wife.

Not when his numerous calls (and he's proud of himself for keeping it to three an hour, rather than three a minute) go to voicemail every single time.

He sends them off to sleep, declining their offers to stay up with him, and stretches out on the couch, keeping his phone balanced on his chest. Then he just stares at the ceiling and waits.

Jemma will call.

She has to.

x

Four hours after Bobbi and Trip disappear into their respective rooms (and of course his safehouse has enough rooms for all of them; they're a team, this is how they work), he finally gets a call. He sits bolt upright and hits accept before the first ring has finished.

"Jemma?"

"Oh, thank God," she says, and all the breath rushes out of him. For a moment, he's actually light-headed from relief, and he rests his head on his knees, breathing through his nose and burying his free hand in his hair. "Oh, thank God. Are you all right?"

"I'm fine," he says roughly. He can barely speak past the emotion clogging his throat. She's alive.

Thank Christ.

"Are you?" he asks. "Are you safe? Do you need—"

"I'm fine," she interrupts. "Or, well, I'm not fine, but I'm not hurt. A few scrapes and bruises, that's all. I'm with my team. We're safe."

"Thank Christ," he says, and swallows. "Where are you? I've been calling."

"I know, I'm sorry," she says. "They took my phone away."

He sits upright at that. "They?"

She said she was with her team, but if they're under someone else's control…He starts to stand, already mentally mapping out a potential rescue op, but is stopped when she speaks again.

"Coulson," she clarifies. "He took…" She trails off, and he can hear her take a deep breath. "He ordered me not to call you, and I started to do it anyway. So he took my phone. And Fitz's."

"Coulson," he says flatly. "He doesn't trust you?"

She doesn't say anything.

"Jemma?"

"Not me," she says, soft and apologetic.

"He didn't trust me," he realizes. "Your word wasn't enough?"

It's a reasonable precaution—he's never even met Coulson, and with the revelation that a good portion of SHIELD's forces were actually undercover HYDRA operatives, it makes sense that the man wouldn't automatically trust him—but it still pisses him off. He's spent more than a day in a spiral of panic and fear, terrified and trying his hardest not to face the possibility that Jemma was dead, and the fact that all of that was just because her commanding officer has trust issues…

Jemma hesitates again. "Is Trip there?"

Grant glances at the doorway and is not at all surprised to find Trip and Bobbi both standing there. If the single ring of the phone didn't wake them, his voice probably did. Usually that wouldn't be enough—they can sleep through one another's noises, after years spent working together—but today's far from usual.

"Yeah," he says. "What's up?"

"Put me on speaker, please?" she requests.

He nods Trip and Bobbi into the room and switches the phone to speaker, then places it on the coffee table. He's deliberately not thinking about why, because he'll find out in a few seconds anyway, and his mind has had enough of a pointless, panic-related workout today.

"Okay," he says. "You're on speaker."

"I'm sorry to have to tell you this way," she says, and he can hear tears in her voice. A chill works its way up his spine as Trip and Bobbi redirect themselves from the armchairs they were headed to in favor of joining him on the couch. Whatever Jemma has to say, it's obviously bad. "It's news better shared in person, but you need to know. And there's no good way to say it, so I'm just going to—"

"Jemma," he interrupts, because he can tell she's on her way to rambling. "Whatever it is…just say it."

"Garrett was HYDRA," she says quickly, and it hits Grant right in the stomach.

He can't speak. For a moment, he can't even breathe.

"What?" Trip says flatly.

"I'm sorry," Jemma says, and he can tell she's actually crying now. "But it's true. He admitted it—he tried to kill Coulson and May. And he was going to—to keep Fitz, to force him to work for HYDRA."

Of her team, there are three names conspicuously missing from that list, but he only cares about one of them. He forces himself to put his emotions aside. The fact that his SO—his mentor, the man who recruited him into SHIELD and recommended him for this team—is a traitor can wait. He'll deal with it later.

"What about you?" he asks.

"I wasn't with them when he revealed himself," she says. "I was with Agent Hand."

That hits Grant nearly as hard as the revelation about Garrett, and he stares at the phone, speechless.

"Agent Hand?" Bobbi asks for him, pressing her knee against his in silent comfort. "Jemma, were you in the Hub when SHIELD fell?"

"Yes," she says. "Before you ask, it was horrible, and I'd really rather not talk about it." She takes a deep breath. "The important thing is, I'm fine. And so are you. Right?"

"Right," he manages. "We're fine. We're in one of my safehouses." He rubs at his forehead; now that he knows Jemma is alive and well, exhaustion is really setting in. "Are you still at the Hub?"

"No," she says. "And that's the other thing I need to tell you, in case you haven't heard."

"Heard what?" he asks, exchanging resigned looks with Bobbi and Trip. What else could have gone wrong?

As it turns out, the answer is a lot.

"Your government," she says pointedly. "In its infinite wisdom, has declared SHIELD a terrorist organization, and all of its members have been added to the Most Wanted list. They sent the military to take the Hub."

"Th—"

"We're fine," she hurries on, before he can even get the word out. "Coulson enacted Odyssey protocol. Unfortunately, the others decided they were better off surrendering and taking chances with the military, but…most of my team is here on the Bus."

"Most?" he asks.

"Agent Wright accompanied Agent Hand when she left," she says quietly. "To, um. To take Garrett to the Fridge."

Grant lets out a slow breath. Somehow, that's comforting. Wright was one of Garrett's students, too. At least one of them gets to slam the door on that traitorous bastard's face.

"Okay," he says. "So where are you going?"

"That's the thing," she says. "We're not sure. Coulson's badge apparently had coordinates programmed into it. He thinks it's a message from Director Fury, so…we're following them."

All three of them stare at the phone for a long moment.

"SHIELD badges are solid metal," Bobbi says finally. "They're not really…programmable."

"Yes, it took all of us by surprise," Jemma acknowledges. "But…it's something. And that's better than nothing, isn't it?"

"It is," Trip agrees, giving Grant a this isn't the time for your pessimism glare when he goes to disagree. "Are you gonna share those coordinates, or do we need to know the Coulson's-team password to get 'em?"

Jemma laughs, and even though it's half-hearted, it's enough to loosen a few more of the knots in Grant's chest. Regardless of what might have happened when HYDRA made its move, Jemma is alive and well and apparently in a safe place, at least for now.

There's no point in dwelling on the past. Jemma made it through the Hub alive. That's what matters.

"No," she says. "I've been authorized to share them with you."

She says it easily, but Grant suspects it took a lot of effort to get that permission. Coulson made her wait more than a day before letting her let Grant know she was alive. Giving up their destination? She must have had to fight, hard, to get him to agree to that.

He's more than a little proud of her for it.

"All right," he says. "Let's have 'em."

"49, 27, 41 north, negative-80, 3, 40 east," she says. "It's Ontario, essentially in the middle of nowhere. We're about an hour out."

Grant and Trip both look to Bobbi. She's got the freakish ability to calculate flight time in her head, and she gives them a little grimace.

"At full speed, we could make it in three hours," she says. "But full speed uses up fuel faster and we don't have enough to make it all the way to Ontario in one shot."

"And with SHIELD gone, there are no convenient refueling stations open," Grant concludes grimly.

"Not to mention, Mach 2 risks the cloak," Trip adds. "And with the military on our tail…"

Bobbi and Trip both look at Grant.

"Up to you, man," Trip says. Unspoken is the sentiment that the longer it takes to get there, the longer Jemma is left with no one but Fitz and a team they don't know to watch her back. It's hard to imagine Coulson or May—especially May—working for HYDRA, but then, Grant would have said the same of Garrett. And their hacker, Skye, is a complete variable.

Trip and Bobbi will let him make the call. They'll let him risk their lives—or at least capture by the US military—for Jemma's sake, and he appreciates it. He's tempted by it, too. But, after a brief struggle between emotion and duty, he shakes his head. If Jemma was in danger, it would be one thing. But with no current threat to her life, he can't justify endangering his team.

"How fast can we get there without risking the cloak or needing to stop?" he asks.

Bobbi frowns. "Nine hours."

Leaving Jemma alone with a team he can't trust at a location he doesn't know is secure for eight hours. Great. He reminds himself again of his duty, and then of the fact that Melinda May is a close personal friend of Romanoff's. If she was anything less than completely solid, Romanoff would have picked up on it.

Right?

"Okay," he says, and takes a deep breath. "We'll be there in nine hours, then."

"Good," Jemma says. "Be safe."

"You, too," he says. "Call us when you get there, okay? Let us know whether the location is secure."

"Will do," she promises. "I have to go now. I'll see you in nine hours. I love you."

"Nine hours," he agrees. "Love you, too."

He waits until she ends the call to lean forward and pick his phone up off the coffee table. Then he just holds it, letting his relief overwhelm him for a moment. He won't be able to truly believe that Jemma's safe until he's there with her, until he, Bobbi, and Trip are watching her back, but she's alive. She's alive, and that's so much more than he had before she called.

Trip and Bobbi, on either side of him, are sitting closely enough that their shoulders brush his, sharing in his relief and his worry for Jemma, just as he and Bobbi shared in Trip's anger for his grandfather's legacy. Just as he and Trip shared in Bobbi's grief when she got divorced.

Grant believes that Garrett is a traitor, because Jemma is the one who said it and he doesn't doubt her word. It's hard to accept it, though. It's hard to think badly of the man who gave him this—who gave him a team, a family—people who share in his emotions, and whose emotions he can share in, without getting tangled up in words and missed signals.

People who just assume that they're going to accompany him to Jemma's side, with no thoughts of stopping in to see their own loved ones, because Jemma is the only one still in danger.

Trip and Bobbi annoy the hell out of him sometimes, but he wouldn't trade them for anything. And he wouldn't have them if Garrett hadn't decided that he needed to work in a team to improve his people skills. For that alone, it's hard to hate him.

They take a moment, there on the couch, just to process things. To process that his and Trip's mentor is a traitor. That the organization they've dedicated their lives to was run by the enemy. That their own government has declared them terrorists.

Then, in unspoken agreement, they stand and go their separate ways to pack. They've got work to do.

x

A little over an hour into their flight (auto-pilot this time; he doesn't need the distraction and they've got plans to make about what happens next), Jemma calls again, bearing more news.

"I've good news and bad news," she says, after assuring him of her safety. "Which would you like first?"

"Bad news," he says, ignoring the eye roll it earns him from Trip and Bobbi.

"The Fridge has fallen," she says plainly. "HYDRA took it."

Well. Fuck.

"And the good news?" Bobbi asks, after they take a moment to absorb that.

"There's quite a bit of it," Jemma says, in a tone which is probably supposed to be cheerful but falls pretty short of the mark. "First of all, Wright made it out of the Fridge alive. He's on his way here, and should arrive in the next few hours. Which brings me to the fact that the coordinates in Coulson's badge led us to a secret base called Providence. We're completely safe, well hidden, and we have enough supplies to last us literal years."

"Okay," he says, after nearly a full minute of stunned silence. "That is good news."

"You see?" she teases. "Things are looking up!"

x

Of course, they don't stay that way for long. She calls again seven hours later, and this news is less encouraging.

"I have bad news and news that I'm not sure how to classify," she says, after assuring him (slightly impatiently) that she's still safe.

"Well, now I'm curious," Trip says before he can speak. "Give us the other news, first."

"Garrett is dead," she tells them frankly. "Wright killed him during the struggle at the Fridge."

There's a long moment of silence. Grant has no idea how to feel about that news, and he can tell by looking at him that Trip doesn't, either. The man was a traitor, and they won't mourn him. But he was also their mentor, and now he's dead.

"And the bad news?" Bobbi asks eventually.

"When HYDRA took the Fridge, they released all of the prisoners," Jemma says. "We're going to have to round them all up."

"Awesome," Trip says.

"That's just what this day needed," Grant agrees.

"I'm afraid it gets worse," she says, apologetic. "Coulson has personal experience with one of them and has a good idea of where he'll be headed."

He closes his eyes. "I really hope this isn't going where I think it's going."

"Afraid so, darling," she says. "We're leaving in five."

Bobbi claps a hand over his mouth before he can speak, which is probably just as well. Chances are that everything he has to say would make him feel like an asshole in about ten minutes, so he doesn't fight her. He does, however, give Trip a beseeching look, because someone has to argue over this insane plan of Coulson's, to take Grant's untrained wife to capture a criminal dangerous enough to be locked in the Fridge.

"We'll be there in an hour," Trip points out obligingly. "You can't wait that long?"

"Apparently not," she says. "I tried, I really did, but Coulson's not willing to wait. He says there's a life at stake."

Grant slumps back against his seat, defeated. He knows they've got no chance of talking Jemma out of this if there are lives in immediate danger. She's completely unreasonable like that.

Bobbi knows it, too. She lets go of him and pats him consolingly (and condescendingly) on the head.

"Don't worry," Jemma adds. "We've got a plan, and—"

"A plan," he interrupts flatly. "That's great, Jem. Really comforting."

"I'm sorry," she says pleasantly. "Are you thinking of lecturing me on risk taking?"

He pinches the bridge of his nose, because that is a conversation that never goes well. "No."

"Good," she says. "Now, if you've no more interruptions to offer, I was about to say that Wright is injured and can't accompany us on this mission. Therefore, Coulson requests that you meet us in Portland, rather than Providence, and assist us."

Well, that changes things. He clamps down on his immediate need to agree and looks to Trip and Bobbi. It's been a very, very long few days, and his teammates are only running on the few hours of sleep they got at his safehouse in Sofia. This isn't a decision he has the right to make for them.

"Like that's in question," Bobbi scoffs, and Grant lets out a slow breath.

"No place we'd rather be, Jemma," Trip promises. "You're headed to Portland?"

"That's right," she confirms, sounding relieved. "Portland, Oregon."

"We can be there in four hours," Bobbi says.

"We'll be there in three," Jemma says. "We'll call you once we've established a base, let you know where to meet us."

"We'll see you in four, then," he says. "In the meantime, be safe. Please."

"I will," she promises. "I love you."

"Love you, too."

x

They make it the rest of the way to Portland without any more phone calls, which Grant is of two minds about. On the one hand, no news is generally good news. On the other, his wife is currently on an op to bring in an escaped convict who is most likely a very dangerous psychopath, considering the facility from which he escaped (and Grant's cursing himself for not getting some detail on the guy; that's what happens when he lets his emotion blind him—he gets sloppy) and he'd appreciate some contact.

Bobbi and Trip, although sympathetic, both suggest that he should chill. He suggests that they should go fuck themselves. It definitely does not devolve into a childish shoving match, and that's the story they're sticking to.

When they reach Portland, they still haven't heard from Jemma about where her team has set up, so Grant lands the Quinjet on a random rooftop, and they settle in to wait.

"It strike you as weird that Coulson called us in for back-up?" Trip asks after a while.

"You mean after making Jemma wait more than a day to tell Ward she was alive?" Bobbi asks. (Of course they asked, on the flight over, what took Jemma so long. They were about as impressed as he was by it—which is to say, not at all.) "The thought did cross my mind."

"A life is at stake," Grant mutters, a little bitterly, and Bobbi nudges him.

"Lighten up," she says. "Jemma has just as much right to risk her life as you have to risk yours. Remember how we talked about this when she joined her team in the first place?"

"Yeah, she joined a field team and then SHIELD fell," he says.

"SHIELD did not fall because Jemma joined a field team," Trip says. "Hell, she's lucky she did. If she hadn't, she'd have been at the Sandbox when this shit happened, and I haven't heard it said what happened there, have you?"

"No," he says. He knows where Trip is going with that; if they still had the Sandbox, it definitely would have made Jemma's list of good news. And he knows he's being irrational. He's just…worried. He's allowed to worry about his wife.

"You know what you need?" Bobbi asks.

"A more sympathetic team?" he suggests.

"Good guess," she says. "But no. You need something to eat."

"What is it with you two and forcing food on me?" he wonders, as Bobbi digs a power bar out of one of the pockets of her go-bag and hands it to him.

"You get cranky when your blood sugar's low," Trip says wisely. "It's either make you eat or punch you in the face."

"You mean it's either make me eat or get your ass kicked," he corrects.

"Yeah, keep telling yourself that, Ward," Bobbi snorts.

He does unwrap the power bar and eat it, though. He's not hungry—not when he's this worried about Jemma—but he knows better than to turn down food when it's on offer. Especially when he's running on no sleep at all.

He's just shoving the wrapper into his pocket (the Quinjet is slightly lacking in trash cans) when his phone rings.

"Hello?"

"Hello," Jemma says, slightly breathlessly. "Sorry about the delay. We had to stage a quick rescue op. Don't worry," she hurries on, before he can react. "Everyone's fine. But it turns out that in addition to being a psychopath, our target is also a stalker, and being locked up did not cure him of it."

"Imagine that," Trip mutters.

"Where are you now?" he asks.

"We're on our way to a safehouse," she answers, and gives them an address. Bobbi pats him on the shoulder and gets up, moving to the cockpit to get them in the air. "I'm with Miss Nathan. The others are working on a way to contain Daniels, as our first plan failed."

"Daniels?" Grant asks sharply. "You mean the Darkforce guy?"

"Oh, you've heard of him?" she asks, in a falsely casual tone. He gets the feeling that her failure to provide information on the target the last time she called was entirely deliberate.

"Yeah, I have," he says. "Jemma, if you've got the object of Daniels' obsession and no way to protect yourself from him…"

"That would be your job," she counters. "So meet us at the location, and everything will be fine."

"This isn't—"

"We'll be there," Trip interrupts. "Thanks, Jemma."

"Thank you, Trip. I'll see you soon."

She hangs up before he can say anything else, and he forces himself to put his anger aside as he returns his phone to his pocket. He's not angry at Jemma, not really. He's angry at the situation: at the fact that SHIELD was HYDRA, that their two teams—nine people in all—are all that's left of the SHIELD he thought existed, and that Coulson seems determined to put Jemma in danger.

All very reasonable things to be angry about, he thinks, but if he doesn't get it under control, he's just going to end up taking his temper out on Jemma, and that's the last thing he wants. So he puts it aside and focuses on his job.

"All right," he says. "What do we know?"

They've all heard bits and pieces about Daniels, and together, they manage to piece together what they're pretty sure is the whole picture. It doesn't take long, which is good, because neither does reaching their destination. It's an apartment building—not a surprise, since the address Jemma gave them came with an apartment number—and Bobbi sets the Quinjet down on the roof.

"Area's too populated to drop the cloak," she observes, grimacing out the windshield. "We're gonna have to leave it up."

"That's fine," Trip says. "As long as no one forgets where we parked this time."

"Hey, that was all you," Bobbi defends.

This is an argument that Grant usually takes part in—the op in question was a rescue in which he was the objective, so he was barely conscious and therefore bears absolutely none of the blame, as he likes to remind them—but now that he's so close to seeing Jemma again, he's not in the mood.

"Let's go," he says shortly, cutting through their banter.

He ignores the brief, silent communication Trip and Bobbi share. All he cares about is the result, which is the two of them checking their weapons and then indicating their readiness.

The apartment, when they reach it, is empty. It's not surprising that they've beaten Jemma here, since she's (presumably) driving and they were flying, but it is annoying. They clear the apartment, make sure it's secure, and then Trip stays behind to ensure it stays that way while Grant and Bobbi go downstairs to wait for Jemma out front.

It's not necessary, and in fact may draw undue attention to them. But he can't resist. He hasn't seen Jemma since Christmas, and that was just for a few days—he was preparing for the op that got blown yesterday (the day before? His usually-flawless internal clock has been thrown completely off by everything that's happened in the past few days), while her team was on downtime for reasons he wasn't cleared to know.

He can't help but smile a little at the memory, Jemma's glee at the shoe being on the other foot for once, at him being in the dark about her work instead of the other way around, and it calms him a little—but not much. Separation is nothing new for them; he was away for weeks and occasionally months at a time on ops with Garrett (the bastard) from the very first days of their relationship. He's used to leaving her behind to risk his life. But Jemma being in danger when they're separated? That—this—is new, and he doesn't like it at all.

Bobbi doesn't say anything about how unnecessary it is to wait for Jemma outside, or about Grant's tension. He's pretty sure that's because she's feeling some of her own. Both of his teammates are close to Jemma—alternating between calling her their sister-in-law and threatening to steal her from him, depending on the day—and knowing she's in danger doesn't sit any better with them than it does with him.

It's only about ten minutes before Jemma pulls into the parking lot, but each one feels like a year. After spending an entire day thinking she was dead, his patience is beyond shot. Still, he manages to hold himself back when she walks up to them, because she's being trailed by a civilian who looks beyond freaked, and dramatic reunions don't tend to inspire confidence.

"Oh, good," Jemma says. "You're here." She turns slightly to include the civilian in the conversation. "Audrey, these are Agents Ward and Morse. They're with the CIA, as well."

CIA? Really, Jemma?

"Grant, Bobbi, this is Audrey Nathan," she continues. "Mr. Daniels attempted to corner her on her run this morning."

They exchange the expected pleasantries, then Bobbi steps back and motions to the door.

"Miss Nathan, if you'll come this way, please," she says. "I'll get you set up in our safehouse while my colleagues take care of some…minor details."

"Thank you," Audrey says. She's clearly on edge, standing out on the sidewalk like this, and if she's being stalked by a psychopath Grant can't say he blames her. "Lead the way."

"Thank you, Bobbi," Jemma agrees. "And, so you know, our comms are on channel 1295."

"Got it," Bobbi says. She squeezes Jemma's arm—the closest she'll get to admitting how worried she was while they've got a terrified civilian to protect—and then leads Audrey into the building. The door has no sooner closed behind them than Grant has Jemma in his arms, with absolutely no memory of how she got there.

Frankly, he really doesn't care.

"Christ, Jemma," he says. It's all he can manage, really. His entire world has narrowed to her—to her arms around him, her hands fisted in his shirt, and the deep, steady breaths she's taking. His arms are tight around her—maybe even too tight; he's really not capable of modulating his strength at the moment—and for the first time in forty hours, he doesn't have to struggle to breathe.

She's here. She's safe. There's a dangerous psychopath on the loose, but he's right here with her and he can protect her himself, rather than leaving her safety to a team he doesn't know and can't trust.

"Grant," she says, and her arms tighten a little. "I thought—when we realized all of SHIELD's files were out, I thought—"

"Bobbi got a warning that our covers were blown," he says. They still have no idea who sent it, and probably never will, since Bobbi's personal phone (and its attendant call log) was in her room at the Hub. "We didn't even know how bad things were until we got out of the city." He takes a deep breath, remembering the terror of those hours, when every single call they made went unanswered. "When you didn't answer your phone…"

"I'm sorry. There was the-the Hub, and then treating the wounded, and then Coulson took my mobile, and I—"

"It's okay," he interrupts, because he can tell she's building up to a breakdown. She's probably been teetering on the edge of one for the past two days—fuck knows he has—and she deserves a chance to deal with it, but this really isn't the time. "It wasn't your fault. I'm sorry I brought it up."

She scoffs and pulls back a little, and he forces himself to loosen his grip and allow the movement (although it's not easy).

"You're ridiculous," she says, sounding much steadier. "I make you wait an entire day to hear I'm alive, and you're sorry you brought it up?"

He considers it. "Yeah."

She laughs a little and lets go of him entirely in favor of scrubbing her hands over her face.

"You're ridiculous," she repeats, and she sounds lighter, too. "What am I going to do with you?"

"I've got some suggestions," he says (and boy does he). "But they're gonna have to wait 'til we get to that Providence base of yours."

She socks him in the arm, he laughs, and just like that, the heavy emotions are put away. They'll have to deal with them later—because five minutes is not enough to work through the terror of spending an entire day thinking she might be dead, and he hasn't forgotten that she spent that time worrying the same of him—but now isn't the time, and they both know it.

SHIELD is gone, but they're still SHIELD agents. They have jobs to do. (Which is also the reason he hasn't—and won't—kiss her: because if he starts kissing her, he won't stop.)

"Right," she says. "Fitz and Coulson are on their way. They're going to set up in another apartment and keep working on a counter for Daniels' powers."

"We're too exposed out here," he says. "We should get inside."

"Let's," she agrees, and leads the way into the building.

"Speaking of Coulson," he says, as they take the elevator to the appropriate floor. "We were kind of surprised he asked for our help on this, all things considered."

"It was Wright's idea," she explains. "In fact, he insisted on it. Either you three came to back us up, or he would come himself, cracked ribs be damned."

He always did like Wright. "Gutsy."

"He's very protective of us," she says fondly. "He was entirely serious. Of course, I supported his campaign to ask for your assistance—not just because I wanted to see you, although naturally that was a part of it, but because he really is in terrible shape. He needs rest, not to go gallivanting off after some super-powered psychopath."

The same could be said of her—of all of them, really—but he keeps it to himself as they come to a stop outside the apartment. He raises his fist and knocks a quick one-five-two pattern, then stands back as Trip opens the door.

"Good to see you safe," he tells Jemma, and raises an eyebrow at Grant, a silent you good?

"You, too," Jemma says, as Grant nods. "Thank you for coming."

"Nowhere we'd rather be," Trip says, stepping back to let them into the room. "Any time, any place. You know that."

"Thank you," she repeats, very sincerely. Then she leaves the two of them in the entry way and goes to join Audrey and Bobbi in the kitchen.

Left alone, Trip pins Grant with a serious look. "How is she?"

"On the edge," he says. "Something happened at the Hub. More than SHIELD falling, I mean. Something hit her, specifically."

"And there's been no time to deal," Trip muses. "You got your comm switched to their channel?"

"No," he says, and starts to do so. Trip's hand on his arm stops him.

"You might wanna hold off on that," he advises. "While you were downstairs having your little reunion, Bobbi and I got some intel. Apparently Jemma's CIA lie wasn't too convincing, and when we admitted to being SHIELD, we found out why Coulson was in such a hurry to go after Daniels."

"And?" he asks.

Trip nods at Audrey. "She's his ex."

Grant clamps down hard on his immediate reaction, because the room contains both his clearly stressed wife and an already terrified civilian, and breaking things isn't going to help either of them stay calm. He takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly, then does it again. And again.

"Really," he says, once he's sure it will come out evenly. He's usually better than this at putting his emotions aside, but…again, it's been a really long few days.

"Really."

"Well," he says. "That's, uh…"

"Kind of rich," Trip offers. "Considering the fact it took more than a day for him to let Jemma call you."

"Yeah," he says, and scrubs his hand over his mouth.

It's not that he would want Coulson to leave a civilian in danger, which Audrey clearly was, if Daniels found her in the time it took Jemma and her team to get here. It's just that the hypocrisy grates at him: that Coulson could keep Jemma from finding out whether or not her own husband was alive in the name of security, and then turn around and drop everything when a woman he cares about is in danger.

It's obviously grating on Trip, too, and he can tell by the set of Bobbi's shoulders that, despite the easy conversation she's holding with Jemma and Audrey, she's not happy, either. On this team, they bear each other's grudges, and all of them love Jemma. Usually it's a good thing, but in this particular situation, it's a dangerous combination.

Grant makes a snap decision. "You get a location on Coulson before you turned your comm off?"

He doesn't need to ask to know that Trip's comm is off. He wouldn't hold this conversation with it on.

"Yeah," Trip says. "They were planning on setting up in 5C."

"I'm gonna pay Coulson a visit," he says. It's really the only way; he doesn't trust Coulson, and as long as that's true, Bobbi and Trip won't, either. And Coulson clearly doesn't trust them. This isn't the time to be worrying about each other's loyalties. Unless they clear the air, quickly, this op can only end badly. "Can you…?"

"Go," Trip orders. "We've got this."

Grant claps him on the arm, grateful, and then slips out of the room. He switches comm channels as he walks, and as soon as he gets on the correct one, Fitz's voice is in his ear, saying something about frequency and wavelength. He barely holds back a sigh.

Grant, personally, doesn't have anything against Fitz. As Jemma's husband and best friend, respectively, they get along well enough. But they've never been close, owing mostly to the fact that Fitz is in love with Jemma. She has no idea, of course, but Grant is a specialist. He reads people for a living, and Fitz's feelings for Jemma have been written all over him since the day Grant met him.

It doesn't bother him. He knows that Jemma loves him and has never looked at Fitz that way. But it does bother Fitz, probably for that exact reason. So, while they get along, there's always that weird 'you're in love with my wife/you married the woman I love' awkwardness between them.

His presence probably won't make this conversation go any smoother.

"Wait," Jemma says, just as he reaches the fifth floor. "Where has Grant gone?"

"He stepped out to make a call," Trip says evenly. "Needed a word with the boss."

"Did he?" she asks, unamused. "Well, I hope he remembers that this isn't the moment to be bearing pointless, foolish grudges."

"I wouldn't say his grudge is pointless," Bobbi injects. "But I'm sure he will."

He switches his comm off when he reaches 5C, because he doesn't need Jemma and his team in his ear for this conversation. He doesn't have to knock; the door opens as soon as he reaches it, and Fitz motions him in sharply.

He enters the apartment to find Coulson waiting for him with a disapproving frown. They've never met before, but Grant did some digging when Jemma was first assigned to Coulson's team, so he knows a bit about him. Certainly enough to recognize him on sight, even if the process of elimination didn't do the job for him.

"Agent Ward," Coulson says.

"Agent Coulson."

"When I asked your wife to invite you here," Coulson says. "I was expecting you to stick close to her."

"Thereby sticking close to Audrey, right?" he asks, and crosses his arms. "It's a pretty quick change in tune."

Coulson's eyes narrow. "Excuse me?"

"You heard me," he says. "And you know exactly what I meant. But, in case you needed clarification…" He steps his glare up a notch. "It's a pretty quick turnaround from distrusting me enough to let me spend more than a day thinking my wife was dead to trusting me to have your ex-girlfriend's back."

"Do we have a problem, Agent Ward?" Coulson demands, and takes a step closer to him.

"I spent twenty-eight hours thinking Jemma was dead," he reiterates. "Because you took her phone away to keep her from telling me otherwise. What do you think?"

"I think I don't know a damned thing about you," Coulson says. "Except that you trained under a man who tried to kill us all, Jemma included."

"Well, that's funny," Grant says. "Because I've heard plenty of good things about you. Most of them from Garrett."

"Are you accusing me of something?" Coulson asks sternly.

"No," he says. "Are you accusing me?"

"No," Coulson says. "I'm not. So where does that leave us?"

Grant sighs and consciously relaxes his posture. He's not doing a great job of clearing the air, here, and he won't until he puts aside his anger. So he does.

Then he starts over. "Look, SHIELD is gone, but my team is still loyal. As far as I can tell, you're the closest thing we've got to a Director at the moment. If you'll have us, we'll follow your orders. But you'll have to trust us. Can you do that?"

Coulson gives him a long, thoughtful look. He must like what he sees, because some of the anger and mistrust (although not all of it) disappears from his body language.

"Yeah," he says. "I can do that." He extends his hand. "Welcome to the team, Agent Ward."

"Thank you, sir," Grant says, and shakes his hand.

Everything isn't forgiven, but he thinks they'll be able to work together well enough, as long as Coulson doesn't pull anything else. And if he does, well…

Grant's not worried about this coming down to Jemma being forced to choose between teams. He knows exactly what choice she'd make. And he has a feeling that Coulson does, too. Which is precisely why he won't risk it.

x

With the air (somewhat) cleared between their two teams, they're able to work together without any further bumps, and they take Daniels down (or out, rather) successfully. It involves using Audrey to bait a trap at the auditorium, then redirecting the energy of the stage lights to overwhelm Daniels' powers. Grant's honestly not sure on the exact science (despite what his taste in women would suggest, it's never been his strongest subject), but it works. Actually, Daniels kind of…explodes.

It's pretty weird.

The point is, they take down Daniels, see Audrey safely home (she still doesn't know that Coulson is alive, which Grant thinks is kind of a dick move on Coulson's part, and also goes a long way to explain the whole phone confiscation thing), and then prepare to return to Providence.

Things get a little sticky, there, because Grant and his team want Jemma to fly with them, whereas Coulson and Fitz want her with them. Bobbi points out, reasonably, that Coulson and Fitz have had Jemma for months, and that the three of them haven't had any significant time with her since September. Fitz counters with the accusation that they'll just take Jemma and disappear, an idea which Grant, admittedly, should probably not have thanked him for.

It's getting a little tense, and starting to move from squabble to full-out argument, when Jemma interrupts.

"Oh, for goodness' sake," she snaps. "You're all being ridiculous."

"Jemma," he starts, and she whirls on him.

"Don't Jemma me," she orders. "You and I both know that none of you are intending to abandon SHIELD, and suggesting that you might was nothing more than you stirring the pot, which is entirely unhelpful."

Then she turns to frown at Bobbi.

"And I expect you to be the voice of reason when he gets like this," she says. "Not support him. You two should be ashamed of yourselves."

"Sorry, Jemma," Bobbi says—though she doesn't look particularly repentant.

"Sorry, Jemma," he echoes. (He's really not.)

Fitz is looking smug, until Jemma rounds on him.

"And you," she says. "Know very well that if I intended to leave SHIELD, which I do not, I would never go without you. The insinuation that I would abandon you the first moment we were separated is both ludicrous and offensive."

"Sorry, Simmons," Fitz mutters.

Finally, Jemma looks to Coulson.

"Now, if you'll excuse us, sir," she says. "It's been three months since last I saw my husband, and I'd like to fly back to Providence with him. If that's all right?"

Her tone dares him to say it's not, and Coulson holds up his hands innocently.

"Go right ahead," he says. "We'll meet you there."

"Thank you," she says.

That settled, they split up to return to their respective aircraft—Fitz and Coulson to the jump jet they apparently landed in a field outside the city, and the rest of them to the Quinjet they left on the roof of the apartment building.

Trip, as the only one who didn't get scolded, is insufferably smug the whole way there. Grant doesn't mind too much; Jemma's coming with them, and that's all he wanted. She sits in the backseat with him and holds his hand the whole way to the apartment building, and he thinks maybe he's not the only one who found this particular separation more difficult than usual.

He does kind of regret being in a Quinjet instead of a jump jet, though—mostly because, unlike a jump jet, a Quinjet doesn't have a bulkhead between the cockpit and the seating in the back. Which means that there's still no opportunity for real privacy, even though Trip and Bobbi kindly stay in the cockpit and leave the back to Grant and Jemma.

It's privacy enough. With no one but Jemma and his team to see him, Grant doesn't feel the need to hide what he's feeling. As Bobbi gets the Quinjet in the air, he tugs Jemma into his lap and rests his forehead against hers. He's so exhausted—both mentally and physically—that he can't even begin to verbalize everything he's thinking (not that he's great at it on his best of days).

Jemma does it for him. "Please don't do that to me again."

Her voice shakes slightly, as do her hands where they rest on his shoulders. Even the slightest pretense of anger has disappeared, and she suddenly looks just as exhausted as he feels.

"I can't give you any promises," he admits, tightening his grip on her reflexively. "But I'll do my best if you will."

"All right," she says, and kisses him once, softly. "I can live with that."

"Yeah," he says, and kisses her (a little less softly). "You'd better."